Berty Albrecht

Bertie Albrecht is a resistant French, born Bertie Wild with Marseilles on February 15th, 1893 and deceased in 1943 with the prison of Fresnes.

Exit of a Protestant family of Swiss origin of the Marseilles middle-class, it studies with Marseilles, then with Lausanne and obtains its diploma for the occupation of nurse in 1912. She leaves then for London and works like supervising in a pension of young girls. At the beginning of First World War, it returns to Marseilles where it works for the Croix-Rouge in several military hospitals.

In 1918, she marries the Dutch banker Frederic Albrecht, of which she will have two children, Frederic and Mireille. The couple settles in Holland, then in London in 1924. It is there that it meets the English feminists and impassions itself for the condition of the women.

Separated from her husband, it settles with Paris in 1931 and binds with Victor Basch, professor with the Sorbonne and chair Ligue of the Human rights. It creates in 1933 a feminist review, the sexual problem , in which it militates for the freedom of contraception and abortion.

In 1937, it becomes surintendante of factory (social worker) and works with the improvement of the working condition.

Lucid on the reality of the Nazism and hostile to the Agreements of Munich, it accommodates as of 1933 the German refugees in his house of Holy-Maxime. It is there that it meets the captain Henri Frenay. It will take part in all the initiatives of resistance of this one in spite of their political divergences: Albrecht is close to the Communists whereas Frenay is socialist Christian, enemy visceral of the Nazis and the collaborators. Both have doubts during the Forties to 43 on the Général de Gaulle as a political leader of the resistant movements. They completely dispute the Vichyist policy of national Révolution just as the policy of the parties of the end of IIIe République. Together, they will carry out successively three newspapers: News bulletins and propaganda , the small wings , then Truths , before becoming important leaders of the network Combat.

Stopped twice in 1942 by the police force of Vichy, she manages to escape, but she is again stopped on May 28th, 1943 with Mâcon, by the Gestapo. She undergoes torture, before being transferred to the Prison from Fresnes, which she will not leave. Its body is found in the cemetery of the prison in May 1945. The circumstances of its death were never elucidated, even if much considers that it probably committed suicide. It is buried in the crypt of the Mont Valérien, only woman to be rested there.

Distinctions

Companions of the Release (it is one of the six women named in this Order)
Military decoration (on a purely posthumous basis)
Military Cross 1939-1945 with palm
Médaille of Resistance with rivet washer

Evocations in the literature

; Theater

Michele Fabien, Berty Albrecht , Editions Acts South-Papers, 1989.

External bonds

Biography on the site about the Release

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